"The exploration of the social conditions that facilitate or retard the search for scientific knowledge has been the major theme of Robert K. Merton's work for

"The purpose of these essays is to expose the nonscientific and half-scientific elements in modern sociology and related disciplines." -- v (preface).

A highly readable introduction to and overview of the postwar social sciences in the United States, The Americanization of Social Science explores a critical pe

"A remarkably detailed, knowing, critical, and even-handed study of one of the most dramatic, complex, and prophetic sociologists of our time". -- Robert K. Mer

This book argues that knowledge is now central to the modern economy and its productive processes. It is also essential for social relations, social cohesion an